BDGA Golf Academy
BDGA George Academy can make your dreams become a reality
Our Academy is for Competitive Golfers
Through a holistic teaching approach, students of all ages and abilities learn to apply effective golf performance processes, which in turn produce lower scores and better golfers.
Unlike a one hour lesson, the academy gives you time to not just learn a new technique, but also to practice your new techniques under the watchful eye of the coach Hendrik and SM.
There’s an advantage to a group environment because of encouragement, shared struggles, and extra motivation when you see someone next to you working hard and making progress. Also, during the academy, you’ll get a well-rounded look into all parts of your game, for chipping, putting, sand play, driving, and more, plus on-course time with your coach.
Five Ways To Pick A High-quality Teacher Or Coach
Great teachers, coaches, and mentors, like any rare species, can be identiɹed by a few
characteristic traits. The following rules are designed to help you sort through the
candidates and make the best choice for yourself.
- Avoid Someone Who Reminds You of a Courteous Waiter
- Seek Someone Who Scares You a Little
- Seek Someone Who Gives Short, Clear Directions
- Seek Someone Who Loves Teaching Fundamentals
- Other Things Being Equal, Pick the Older Person
The Coaches
Hendrik Buhrmann
- Hendrik Buhrmann has 32 years of experience in the competitive golf world as a golf coach and professional golfer.
- Coached some of South Africa’s top players – Charl Schwartzel, Louis Oosthuizen, Richard Sterne, James Kingston, Keith Horne.
- Competed on European Tour, Sunshine Tour, Asian Tour and European Senior Tour
- Won 9 professional titles
- Represented South Africa in the World Cup in 1995 with teammate Retief Goosen
- Represented Southern Africa in the Dunhill Challenge, with teammates Ernie Els, Retief Goosen, Nick Price, David Frost – captained by Gary Player
- Helped restructure the Asian tour as it is today
- Served on the board of directors of the Asian Tour and still on the Sunshine Tour board
SM van Achterbergh
- 12 years of golf coaching experience
- Fully qualified AA PGA member
- 8 years coaching under the mentorship of Hendrik Bührmann
- Has coached top juniors, including Jean Du Toit, one of the country’s leading juniors, Kera Healey, now a college player in the USA, and Chad Stanton, the Under-13 champion
- Also assists in coaching professionals like James Kingston, MJ Viljoen, and others
The Holistic Approach to: physically, technically and mentally
We believe that at BDGA, you have to grow and develop all these three aspects together. To understand it better, I will use the following example: building a house, you cannot start with the roof first, you can separately, away from the site. But you have to start with the foundation, right. Then you build the walls and doors, and then only then do you put the roof on.
There's a particular order, and that is exactly the same. To develop your golf game and become as good a golfer as possible, you first must work Physically, then Technically, and finally Mentally. But this recipe works in a daily growing pattern. The difference is then building a house and building your potential as a golfer. You build a new house daily and start the next day again to build it better than the day before. This pattern is a recipe for success. That's how all the top players in the world do it, as well as Hendrik, who played on the Major Tours for 30 years.
This is where the modern and the old school get together, where Hendrik taught SM Van Aghterbergh all the fundamentals, where SM understood the technology, and the younger generation of today, made him one of the best coaches of the modern era.
Physically
BDGA is working close with Willie van De Berge. He is in a class of his own in golf expertise as one of the best physios in the country, working with the Sunshine Tour for many years
Technically
Technique is important from a young age, because you do not want to change your fundamentals when you already have a high level of skills as a competitive golfer.
It's important to have a sound technique to help you be more consistent and play your best golf.
If we can explain it this way, you first built the best car you can, and then you learn to drive that car, not the other way around. Which means you must own your golf swing first, before you can perform with your swing.
As the experts always say, work on your technique when you're young and teachable
Mentally
To help you reach the highest level of golf performance, we take a unique holistic approach that focuses on both your mental and physical skills. Just like driving an inferior car with a world-class driver won't result in best performance - without being physically and technically sound, it's impossible to maximize your mental game for peak performance. So don't forget: while having strong inner determination is essential to success, attending to all areas of developing yourself as a golfer will provide the foundation necessary for reaching great heights!
In golf, you have to own your golf swing, so that you can learn the art of scoring skills to perform as well as you can. The secret is to understand the correct process, how to build your best mind to perform your best. We at BDGA know how. We have one of the best Mental evaluation systems to test our performed under pressure, which we use for more than 17 years with great success to the top players in the world
BDGA George Studio Facilitie
BDGA Golf Studio is located in the heart of the Garden Route where Southern Cape Golf Union is located.
We have state-of-the-art technology to help you achieve your best golf.
Program Content
In its broadest sense, our training program can be divided into 4 parts, Mental, Physical, Technical and Strategic aspects of the game.
At the BDGA Golf Academy, you will work with Hendrik and SM for the duration of the time. Where the experience mate young generation expertise in technology and modern ways to do a better
Discipline, ownership, and respect in our academic curriculum are a feature of life here. Most students will be here because they seek to play golf at a leading college or on tour. In order to do this, they will not only need to excel on the golf course, but also demonstrate a track record of academic achievement in their school work.
Competitive Training Cycle
Various elements that influence a player’s skills
Choose Five Minutes A Day Over An Hour A Week
With deep practice, small daily practice “snacks” are more eʃective than once-a-week practice binges. The reason has to do with the way our brains grow—incrementally, a little each day, even as we sleep. Daily practice, even for 5 minutes, nourishes this process, while more occasional practice forces your brain to play catch-up. Or, as the music-education pioneer Shinichi Suzuki puts it, “Practice on the days that you eat.” How short can these segments be? Hans Jensen, a cello teacher at Northwestern University, provided an example when he taught a time-strapped medical student who desired to practice only two minutes a day. Working systematically, they broke a piece into its component passages, tackling the toughest ones first. The student was able to successfully learn a complex étude in six weeks. “We were shocked at how well it went,” Jensen said. “The key was total focus and being ruthless about noticing and mɹxing every tiny mistake from the start.” The other advantage of practicing daily is that it becomes a habit. The act of practicing—making time to do it, doing it well—can be thought of as a skill in itself, perhaps the most important skill of all. Give it time. According to research, establishing a new habit takes about thirty days.
The Junior Golf Academy
BDGA has an advanced, comprehensive coaching program for developing outstanding young golfers who play competitive golf and want to play at the GolfRSA Squad level and beyond.
It’s based on a successful in-person academy at BDGA Eagle Canyon, where we coach Junior tournament winners
This program is designed to provide a young competitive golfer with everything he needs to maximise his improvement.
We will provide academy coaching in person in the studio and on the golf course. In specific scheduled times, and will also be available 24/7 on the coaching app or Whatsapp.
Junior Academy Program
- Weekly One-on-One Lesson: One-hour private lesson in our studio, scheduled at your convenience.
- Weekly Group Session: Join us every Wednesday afternoon at George Golf Club for a two-hour short game group lesson.
- Personal Training Space: Assess your own training space in CoachNow, with unlimited video uploads and online coaching support.
- Administration Fee: A one-time sign-up fee of R500.
- Cancellation Policy: A one-month notice is required to cancel.
Monthly Fee: R2750
Senior Academy Program
- Weekly One-on-One Lesson: One-hour private lesson in our studio, scheduled at your convenience.
- Personal Training Space: Assess your own training space in CoachNow with unlimited online coaching support.
- Administration Fee: A one-time sign-up fee of R500.
- Cancellation Policy: A one-month notice is required to cancel.
Monthly Fee: R2200
Choose Spartan Over Luxurious
We love comfort. We love state-of-the-art practice facilities, oak-paneled corner offices, spotless locker rooms, and fluffy towels. Which is a shame, because luxury is a motivational narcotic: It signals our unconscious minds to give less eʃort. It whispers, Relax, you’ve made it.
The talent hotbeds are not luxurious. In fact, they are so much the opposite that they are sometimes called chicken-wire Harvards. Top music camps—especially ones that can aʃord better—consist mainly of rundown cabins. The North Baltimore Aquatic Club, which produced Michael Phelps and four other Olympic medalists, could pass for an underfunded YMCA. The world’s highest-performing schools—those in Finland and South Korea, which perennially score at the top of the Program for International Student Assessment rankings—feature austere classrooms that look as if they haven’t changed since the 1950s.
The point of this tip is not moral; it’s neural. Simple, humble spaces help focus attention on the deep-practice task at hand: reaching and repeating and struggling.
When given the choice between luxurious and spartan, choose spartan. Your
unconscious mind will thank you.